IDNO

P.9847.ACH1

Description

On Catalogue Card: Projections of the Mauer jaw.

Place

W Europe; Germany; near Heidelberg; Mauer

Cultural Affliation

Named Person

Photographer

None

Collector / Expedition

Date

Collection Name

Mounted Haddon Collection

Source

Format

Print Black & White Mounted

Primary Documentation

Other Information

Context: “Heidelberg jaw, also called Mauer jaw
enigmatic human mandible, thought to be about 500,000 years old, found in 1907 in the great sandpit at Mauer, southeast of Heidelberg, Germany. Elephant and rhinoceros remains found in association with the fossil indicate a warm climate; the jaw has been assigned to an interglacial period of the middle Pleistocene Epoch. The chinless mandible is massive, with ascending branches almost as broad as they are high. The teeth, proportionately too small for so large a jaw, are human. The dental arch is parabolic, without spaces between the canines and first premolars.” [Source: Britannica Online, JD 17/5/2010]